


I Am But Mad, North-Northwest

by twobirdsonesong



Category: Glee RPF
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Complicated Relationships, Drabble, Established Relationship, Late Night Conversations, M/M, Recreational Drug Use, crisscolfer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-31
Updated: 2014-03-31
Packaged: 2018-01-17 16:25:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1394344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twobirdsonesong/pseuds/twobirdsonesong
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A late night rooftop conversation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Am But Mad, North-Northwest

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: light recreational drug use (pot)

Chris wakes up to a cold and empty bed, which is decidedly different from how he fell asleep. The covers on the other side are pulled up to the unused pillow as though someone attempted to make the bed and there’s no sound coming from the bathroom, no light on in the hallway. But Darren’s glasses are still on the nightstand where he folded them up and his pants are still on the floor, so he hasn’t gone far.

Chris switches on the closest lamp and the soft, warm light lets him see the curtains over the French doors that open out to the balcony have been pushed aside. Chris blinks and then realizes what’s going on. He sighs. For a moment he contemplates tugging the covers up over his head and just going back to sleep. The clock tells him it’s not even 3am and his side of the bed is just the right temperature, though the cooler night air is creeping in and he knows that soon enough his toes are going to get cold and there are no warm calves to tuck them against. Chris throws the covers back and gets out of bed.

He didn’t even know he could get up onto his roof until the night Darren stood out on the balcony, gazing up at the roof, and decided he could make it. Chris couldn’t stop him and he wasn’t going to let him go up there alone. So he’d clambered up after Darren, swearing the whole way. Chris is pretty fucking sure he’s going to wind up with a broken leg or a cracked ribs and he’s going to have to find a way to explain to everyone how he got them without uttering any version of the sentence, “I was on the roof of my house with Darren Criss and I fell off.” He’d just rather not.

Darren is sitting on the angled slant of the roof when Chris hauls himself up there, legs pulled up and arms folded across his knees. Chris can see the faint glow of a lit joint dangling between his fingers and the acrid sweet smoke spilling from Darren’s lips, ghostly in the dim light.

“Thanks for keeping it out of the house,” Chris says as he settles down next to Darren, their shoulders brushing. Los Angeles stretches out vast and endless beneath them, an impossible spread of never-ending lights and tangled streets. Darren holds the joint out towards him, but Chris shakes his head. He won’t be able to get back to sleep if he does. Whatever strain of pot Darren prefers leaves Chris feeling itchy and just left of uncomfortable in his skin.

“Didn’t mean to wake you,” Darren says. His voice has just a touch of the roughness it gets around 3am when he’s been smoking and Chris wonders how long he’s been up here, sitting alone on the roof staring at the city lights burning bright in the distance.

“You didn’t,” Chris replies. Darren shoots him a look and Chris rolls his eyes. “The bed was cold, so I woke up. You didn’t actively wake me up. There’s a difference.”

“Whatever.”

“Bad dream?” Chris leans back on his hands, leaning away from the edge. He always feels off kilter up here, with the pitch of the roof tilting him forward just enough to keep him from really relaxing. It never seems to bother Darren though; he sits as though he’s rooted firmly to the rough shingles. Chris tried joking about him looking like a gargoyle once, but he took it a little too seriously.

“Not really. Just…couldn’t sleep.”

Chris watches Darren lift the joint to his lips and take a slow, measured drag. He remembers being shocked the first time he watched Darren smoke, sitting on the steps of his trailer on the lot with a couple of the Warbler guys, laughing in their shirtsleeves and undone ties. How it wasn’t a big deal to anyone except for the PA who came running over to scold them and ended up taking a little baggie home with him. And he remembers how every corner of the tour bus carried with it that same sickly sweet smell.

“Anything in particular or…?” Chris lets the question trail off as Darren shrugs and exhales a stream of white smoke. His wrists seem delicate in the darkness and Chris can’t stop looking at the dark smudge of his eyelashes.

“Just…” Darren gestures towards the expanse of Los Angeles with long fingers.

It’s one of those nights, then. When Darren’s brain just can’t let go of the things he can’t change, can’t fix, and he’s left with all the things right and wrong and irreparable in his life. Chris doesn’t smoke, but he keeps some in a little wooden box in the back of a drawer for Darren for nights like these.

“When I die,” Darren says suddenly, quietly, but the night is still and the words carry. “I wanna do it all over again. With you.”

Chris blinks. “What?”

“I’m serious.”

“Darren.” Sometimes Darren just gets completely relaxed when he’s high, open and soft and smiling about the world and everything in it. And something he digs down deep into his subconscious, into the things he works so hard to shove away and tries to pretend like aren’t there. Tonight, Chris realizes, is the later.

“When I die I’m demanding a do-over,” Darren repeats. His fingers curl around his bare bicep and Chris realizes he hadn’t put a jacket on, just the t-shirt he’d come over to the house wearing.

“I don’t think it works like that.” Chris pulls his own legs up to his chest and rests his chin on his knee. He’s pretty sure they won’t be going back inside for a while. The night is nice though, cool enough to feel good on his bared skin, warm enough to keep him from shivering. He’s shifted closer to Darren and can feel the heat from his body seeping into his own skin.

“It works however the fuck I want it to work,” Darren purses his lips and Chris can see him twisting the joint – almost gone now – between his fingers. “When I die – whenever the fuck that is – I’m gonna come back and I’m gonna do this again. We’re gonna do this again.”

Chris hates how easily Daren slips into we sometimes; how dangerous they both know it is. “Do what?”

“Everything. The whole thing. This whole fucking thing. Starting right the fuck over. I’m gonna convince my parents to move us to Clovis so I can find you. Or I’m gonna get your parents to move you out of that hellhole and come to the bay.”

Chris snorts. “Yes I’m sure my mom will listen to some weird rich kid telling her to pack her family up and move three hours upstate.”

“Didn’t I say this works however the fuck I want it to?”

Chris holds his hands up. “Yes, sorry. Please continue.”

Darren sighs and pushes his fingers through his messy hair. “I just want to meet you sooner. I want to find you when it’s easier, before it gets all fucked up. I want to do it right and maybe that means things being completely different for both of us. But fuck, man, I’m ok with that. I am.”

“You’ve been reading fan fiction again, haven’t you?” Chris knows he’s trying hide behind a pathetic attempt at a joke to brush this off, to brush Darren off. Because otherwise the thought is too much, too big to handle. Sometimes he can hardly think about how he’s going to make it to the next day, let alone what he could do – would do – with the chance to start his whole life all over again.

“I want it better than this,” Darren says and Chris watches wisps of smoke spill from his lips.

“What’s wrong with this?” Darren shoots him a heavy-lidded look and Chris swallows. He can taste the acrid tang of the smoke on his own tongue.

“Well,” Chris bites his lip against the thousand things he wants to say. “What do you want to do until then? We’ve got some time left until you die and restart the clock. What happens from now until then?”

Darren brings the joint to his mouth once more and Chris can see that it’s just about burned out.

“What if we took a photo together?” Darren asks as he stubs the end out on the tiles of Chris’ roof. Chris would care, except he doesn’t. What does it really matter?

“What?”

Darren digs into his pocket and pulls out his phone. He unlocks the screen and pulls up the camera app. “What if we took a photo?”

“Here? Now?” Chris looks around, as though there might suddenly be someone else lurking just beyond sight. He can see the dark shapes of the other homes in the distance, but he picked his new house because it was set up and out of the way of everything else. Because it felt safe. There’s no one around to catch him sitting on the roof with Darren taking a selfie.

“Yes, here. Now.” Darren holds the camera out and leans into Chris. He’s a heavy weight against Chris’ side and his breath is smoky against Chris’ cheek. It’s not quite full dark and there’s just enough light filtering into the lens that their images appear on the screen, grainy and shadowed, but undeniably them.

“I don’t-” Chris starts to say, but Darren’s fingers twitch and the photo is taken. Just like that. Chris swallows down the lump that climbs up his throat every time Darren snaps another photo or takes another video of him.

“What are you doing?” Chris asks as Darren fiddles with the phone.

“Nothing,” Darren sucks in a harsh breath. “Something. I don’t know.”

Chris watches the screen, his heart pounding loud enough to hear, as Darren pulls up his Twitter and loads up the photo. No caption. Just a picture of the two of them alone in the night.

His thumb hovers over the “tweet” button.

Chris turns fully towards Darren and finds him staring at him, eyes bright and pupils wide in the near dark. “Darren?” Chris’ heart is beating so fast it hurts. Darren almost smiles, just a twitch of his lips, but he darts in and kisses Chris’ mouth fast, too fast.

“Am I mad?” Darren asks, breath hot on Chris’ lips and tasting of pot and a world of unknowable possibilities.

Chris looks down at the phone. Darren’s fingers twitch again.


End file.
